Detective Agency of the Bizarre
Chapter 812 - 5. Bottomless Pool

Chapter 812: 5. Bottomless Pool

The twinkling stars clung high to the dome, crafting the illusion of a beautiful night sky.

Lu Li knew that it wasn’t real.

The rock wall stood straight behind him, making it impossible to see the night sky from the ground.

This was an underground cave.

Lu Li, having emerged from the subterranean rock layers, entered a broader... prison.

The stars twinkling at the top of the cave might be radioactive fluorite or some mysterious luminous objects. They kept the cave from being plunged into darkness.

A river originated from a pond at the other end of the cave, with water gushing up like a fountain and converging into a river flowing toward the narrow gorge.

Splish—

The water flowing into the gorge calmed after Lu Li waded away from the edge.

Standing in the shallows, the biting current gently caressed Lu Li’s calves.

Splish—Splash—

Lu Li walked out of the shallows, standing on the bank at the cave’s edge.

The rock wall was adorned with water droplets formed by the damp air, and withered vines climbed about two meters from the ground.

Reaching out, Lu Li tore down a piece of the vine net, trying to pull it. After absorbing water, they were sturdy and resilient enough.

Tearing off several finger-thick vines, he tied them together into a vine rope over twenty meters long, then pushed a rock, larger than a human head, into the shallows, and looped it with the vine.

Grasping the other end of the vine, Lu Li retreated to the gorge and submerged himself underwater again.

He needed to go back to the rock cavern to find Friday.

A familiar feeling welled up in his heart, but unlike last time, the fog ahead had dissipated.

Before the oxygen ran out, Lu Li glimpsed the firelight on the surface. He emerged from under the rock wall, breaking the water’s surface with a splash.

A fire was crackling on the rock, with a torch and a knife placed next to a coat spread flat.

Besides that, there was no one, and nothing else.

A sudden stabbing pain in his head made Lu Li frown, as the clear memories suddenly became chaotic, entangled with reality and illusions.

The silhouette named Friday gradually faded, as if it had been a long time since he last met her.

Did Friday truly exist, or was she merely an illusion during a desperate moment?

Lu Li climbed onto the rock, observing the fire and the traces on the rock. Yet all signs of life pointed to the fact that only Lu Li lived here.

No cooking pot, no dried books, no wooden bowl, no sea fish and meat, no spices and empty cans.

Suddenly, Lu Li reached out and squeezed his throat, making himself vomit. But he only brought up the water he had drunk earlier.

Perhaps Friday was waiting for him in the underground cave.

Wiping his mouth, Lu Li gathered everything he could from the rock and dove back into the dark river.

The fire in the rock cavern quietly burned. Before long, without fuel, it would return to darkness along with its surroundings.

...

Splish—

Lu Li surfaced at the gorge.

His black hair clung to his forehead as he surveyed the underground cave, finding no trace of Friday.

Cradling his coat that dripped a fine line of water, Lu Li returned to the shore, wringing dry his soaked coat and pants. However, in the damp cave, drying them completely seemed unlikely.

Looking up at the top of the cave, the luminous bodies still flickered uncertainly. Because they existed only at a height of over ten meters, Lu Li couldn’t clearly discern what they were.

The moisture in his body gradually evaporated, but the cold was steadily draining Lu Li’s body heat. His choices were to either light a fire or find a way to the outside world.

Exploring the cave’s edge, apart from the deep pool where the spring surged, there were no other exits.

Lu Li temporarily gave up the idea of diving into the deep pool; he needed to warm up.

The underground cave was relatively clean. Any lightweight debris or stones had been washed into the gorge by the flow, leaving only the withered vines on the rock wall to burn.

As he searched for things to burn, Lu Li thought of proof that Friday indeed existed: without a source of fire, it would be difficult to ignite damp kindling even by friction fire-making.

With this thought, Lu Li looked intently at his palm.

The palm was covered with blisters and wounds.

"..."

Lu Li couldn’t determine if the wounds on his palm had been there before.

Silently, he carried a few wet sticks back to the shore, attempting to make a fire by friction.

It didn’t work. Each time he twisted the branches, a piercing pain shot through his heart from his palm. Though he could endure it, the slowed speed from the intense pain couldn’t create a spark, especially with wet kindling. The dense blisters on Lu Li’s palm told the whole story—if indeed they were caused by friction fire-making.

Lu Li’s gaze fell on the cave’s only exit. Approximately ten meters in diameter, the clear pond made it difficult to see the bottom.

Now, all he could do was find a way to leave before his strength and body heat disappeared.

That is, the deep pool.

Grabbing the torch, Lu Li walked to the edge of the pool and leapt into the water.

A radiant light blossomed, illuminating the dark depths. Lu Li descended about three meters, then was pushed back up by the gushing spring water, unable to continue diving, while the edge of the light still didn’t reach the bottom of the pool.

The pool was deeper than he imagined.

Lu Li floated back up, selecting a rock from the shore weighing approximately 30 pounds, and jumped back into the pool holding it.

The rock quickly dragged Lu Li down, the luminescent cave ceiling disappearing in an instant.

Five meters, ten meters, fifteen meters.

The water pressure pressed against his body from all sides, but Lu Li could still bear it.

Yet a few meters away, the edge of the light still revealed no bottom.

Twenty meters, twenty-five meters, thirty meters.

Nearing the limit of what Lu Li could withstand, the bottom still hadn’t appeared.

Lu Li ceased conserving his humanity; the torch in his right hand suddenly burst into a brighter light. The tangible pressure of the darkness receded, revealing the rock wall around the pool, and the visible distance below gradually increased—

But in his narrowed black eyes, even at forty meters, or even fifty meters deep, the bottom still hadn’t appeared. Only at the edge of the glow, a shadow, like an illusion, fleetingly appeared.

With little oxygen left in his lungs, Lu Li had to release the rock, allowing his body to float upward.

Lu Li controlled his ascent speed, accelerating only when the burning sensation in his lungs became unbearable, bursting back to the surface.

The world became clear suddenly, as Lu Li climbed onto the shallows, lying in the water resisting the subsequent weakness and uncontrollable itchiness.

He had ascended too quickly, causing symptoms of decompression sickness.

Minutes later, the symptoms faded, and the dizzy Lu Li returned to the shore.

The pool was deeper than expected. Unless Lu Li could find something to store air and allow him to be buoyed to the surface, he was nearly impossible to find the pool’s outlet.

Apart from being more spacious and not inducing claustrophobia, the underground cave seemed no different from the rock cavern.

Did the cave have another exit?

Lu Li pondered, looking again at the false stars.

He raised the torch high, humanity blending into the wick, filling the cave with a gentle luminescence like dawn, revealing everything clearly.

The dull yellow fluorite embedding the cave’s top dimmed, becoming lightless. They weren’t the focus, rather, what they clustered around was — an elliptical opening leading to the outside world.

Excitingly, the opening was wide enough for Lu Li to crawl through.

But a problem also arose.

How was Lu Li going to climb the nearly vertical, damp rock wall to the top, and then into the opening in the middle of the cave?